Sud Aviation SE 210 Caravelle in 1/400 Scale

Updated: July 2016

The French Caravelle was the world's first short-medium range jet airliner and took to the air in 1955 (though revenue service entry wasn't until May 1959). It used the nose and cockpit of the British Comet and Rolls-Royce Avon engines but otherwise was all French and introduced the clean wing/rear engine configuration. It is also famous for its triangular windows.

282 aircraft were built - which for the time, and considering the difficulty of selling non-US types in the USA, was a great return. Aeroclassics unsurprisingly is the only manufacturer to have attempted a Caravelle mould. It has gotten some stick for using its Caravelle III mould for other Caravelles but considering the dearth of classic manufacturers I think beggars can't be choosers and it doesn't bother me too much.

I certainly doubt we'll see any other Caravelle moulds in 1:400 anytime soon. Aeroclassics has, as of July 2016, made 46 Caravelles of various marks. The Caravelles I, IA, III and VI-N all had the same configuration and 80 seats, just with improved variants of the Rolls-Royce Avon engine. 163 of the Caravelles built fit into these categories. Here are some Caravelle IIIs:

Aeroclassics (2002-Still In Use)

The Aeroclassics mould dates from 2002 and 27 of the 44 releases represent either Caravelle IIIs or VI-Ns. The mould, despite its age, is very good:

Aeroclassics Caravelle III

Aeroclassics Caravelle III

Aeroclassics Caravelle III

The Caravelle VI-R had thrust reversers and bigger cockpit windows. Judging by photos on airliners.net the cockpit windows weren't dramatically different but the side ones were a different shape and a lot larger. 56 were built including 20 for United which lacked the dorsal tail extension (as the below photo shows). As you can also see Aeroclassics didn't modify the mould at all to take into account the missing extension which as it was a one-off is understandable. Since the airframe was the same as the earlier Caravelles the same mould can be reused with no issues though Aeroclassics does seem to have been a bit lazy with the printing of the modified cockpit windows. 15 of the 44 Caravelles made are VI-Rs.

Aeroclassics Caravelle VI-R

Aeroclassics Caravelle VI-R

Aeroclassics Caravelle VI-R

In 1964 Sud-Aviation introduced the Super Caravelle 10B. This had a new leading edge extension to the wing, modified flaps and a 1.4 m stretch allowing seating for 105 people. The engines were also new in the form of P&W JT9Ds. Only 22 were built.

The Caravelle 11R was similar but with a slightly different length and a cargo door - only 6 were made whilst the Caravelle 10R was a standard Caravelle with the new engines - only 20 were made.

Aeroclassics hasn't made a separate mould to represent the 22 aircraft that make up the 10B production run or the 6 aircraft of the 11R. That's a bit of a shame but doesn't upset me too much. The stretch is almost impercetible at 1:400 anyway but the engines are noticeably wrong on all three versions. Aeroclassics has copped a bit of stick for this but has only thrice made models representing these later Caravelles. I can forgive it as the cost of a new mould isn't really justified. Here's how they ought to look:

Aeroclassics Caravelle 10R

Aeroclassics Caravelle 10R

The last variant of the Caravelle built, the Super Caravelle 12, was a major 3.2 metre stretch and is not represented in 1:400 scale. Sadly with only 12 ever built this is unlikely to change anytime soon!